The Bevin Boys ~ The Forgotten Conscripts

[Tomasso]

"Instead of uniforms they were given a pair of boots and a hard hat and instead of the front line they were sent underground.

And when the Second World War was over, still the Bevin Boys toiled.

They were the forgotten conscripts of the conflict, bringing Britain back from the edge of an energy crisis by shovelling coal at the order of Minister of Labour and National Service Ernest Bevin.

Now, 60 years on, the Bevin Boys have been granted the official recognition they have long deserved."


http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/art...l-shovelling-Bevin-Boys-Second-World-War.html



[video=youtube;i4jRU5m29mY]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i4jRU5m29mY[/video]

 

[ukali1066]

My Grandad was one of these....hard, dirty, thankless work...

 

[Dudleydoright]

So was Jimmy Savile .............. someone certainly 'fixed' it for him back then !

 

[MurderOfGoths]

Hi, was just wondering if anyone could tell me any stories about the Bevin boys or point me to somewhere good to look? My grandad was a bevin boy but sadly died recently, and as he was a very quiet man he never spoke to me about it. I only found out after his death that he had coal dust embedded under the skin on his hands from when he was in the mines, and that he was just 19 when he was sent to Wales to work the mines. Wish I'd pressed him to know more, seems there was a lot I never knew.

 

[V.C. Brunswick]

Another Bevin Boy was Eric Morecambe. He had the misfortune of being sent to a mine that was previously shut down and then was reopened once again. He only lasted about a year until he was sent home for medical reasons. There is some belief that harrowing conditions might have contributed to his heart condition which led to three heart attacks which eventually killed the much beloved comedian in 1984 at age 58.

 

[Warden]

I think it was Eric Morecambe talking about been a Bevin Boy, that made me first aware of them and the role they played in WW2

 

[p51]

Like many Americans (I'd think), I never heard about this until reading this just now.
Wow, what a bad deal those guys got!

 

[esteban68]

My late grandfather was also one of these chaps...picked out in the lottery, 14 hour shifts 6 days a week then Home Guard duty after work, often getting accused of malingering by strangers because he wasn't 'serving'. It cost him a badly broken leg that never healed properly and emphysema that finished him off a few years ago....to cap it all an ungrateful nation via successive 'governments' refused to acknowledge their sacrifice until most of the old lads were dead!

 

[Two Types]

Wow, what a bad deal those guys got!

A bad deal? I think depends on your perspective. Being conscripted into the mines in wartime sounds better than being shot at.

 

[p51]

A bad deal? I think depends on your perspective. Being conscripted into the mines in wartime sounds better than being shot at.

You ever work in a mine, especially in conditions like that? I had uncles who worked mines in the US and when they were called for WW1, when they came back they said it was hell, but still better than mine work.

 

[Two Types]

You ever work in a mine, especially in conditions like that? I had uncles who worked mines in the US and when they were called for WW1, when they came back they said it was hell, but still better than mine work.

You are right, I've never worked in a mine, and nor have I fought in a war. But like I said, it all depends on your perspective. I don't think that life in a mine would have been good but at the end of a shift they went to the surface and carried on with normal life. That wasn't the case for plenty of service personnel etc.

 

[Two Types]

Mind you, spare a thought for the Prisoner of War miners. Imagine what it must have been like to fight, be captured, then sent to work down a German coal mine? Those blokes really had it tough. I knew the widow of one chap who was captured in France in 1940 aged just 16. He spent the next five years in a Silesian coal mine. It seems like a dreadful waste of your teenage years.

 

[Flat Foot Floey]

but at the end of a shift they went to the surface and carried on with normal life.

They take dust lungs and other diseases with them though. I assume you meant psychological? Maybe. But usually bad things don't have to be weighted and compared. They stay bad in any case.

 

[Dragon Soldier]

Some sources put their casualty rate at one in four.

I might be tempted to take my chances with being shot at.